The Band That Time Forgot opens the music vault at the Burren

By Ed Symkus, Correspondent

Wednesday

Oct 10, 2018 at 9:55 PMOct 11, 2018 at 12:15 PM

There was a time when Tim Jackson was playing in seven bands at once. In Boston. A drummer since his middle school days in Westport, Connecticut – when his dad bought him a gold sparkle snare drum ... but, hold on, Jackson, who likes to tell stories, tells a story:

“I was the accomplished little elementary school thespian. I liked performing. But in middle school there was no organized drama, so I said, ‘Can I play something?’ And they said, ‘Here, try the sousaphone.’ But that was hideous. Then I saw someone playing a snare drum, and I just started whamming on it.”

That’s when his dad bought him the drum.

Jackson continued: “I thought, ‘Wow! My dad actually wouldn’t mind if I hit a drum like this?’ So, I set up the snare drum on the back of a chair, I put thumb tacks on my shoes so I could hear the bass drum, and I practiced that way to Beach Boys records – Hal Blaine was their [studio] drummer – until I got some [hand and foot] coordination. Some college kids called and said, ‘We hear you play drums; do you want to play this Yale University gig?’ I said sure.”

And he was off and running, playing all sorts of genres. He drummed with Robin Lane & the Chartbusters, The Night Visitors, the Young Rationals, Stormin’ Norman and Suzie, and Vas Deferens. He went on tour with Tom Rush and with LaVern Baker. He’s also been an actor, a teacher, a photographer, a film critic ... but there were always bands.

In the mid-1980s, he came up with the idea for The Band That Time Forgot, who will be playing at the Burren in Somerville on Oct. 13, with the same lineup they had all those years ago. Jackson has a story about the band’s beginnings:

“I got out of my car in front of Bunratty’s in Allston. I said to my wife, ‘I’ve got a perfect name for a band – The Band That Time Forgot.’ She said that was good. I decided to start it, and I had a concept: ’60s songs that nobody’s ever heard, or have forgotten.

“I called some of my favorite guys I knew from other bands: Larry Luddecke on keyboards, Peter Hoffman on guitar, Richard Gates on bass. I said, ‘I have this idea. We won’t have to travel and tour anymore, we can do things we want to do. Let’s rehearse two songs a week.’ I knew about a wedding where they wanted a ’60s band to play. And by the time of it, we had enough songs to play it.”

Some of the songs were indeed obscure. Jackson recalls playing “Enter the Young” by The Association. “We were going real deep,” he said. “But I realized we could also play ‘Kind of a Drag,’ and people didn’t remember it. And people loved it! They went nuts, so we started playing a lot of gigs for 8 or 10 years.

They play less often now, around once every couple of months. Though Luddecke left for a couple of years, he’s back, keeping that original lineup intact. The band’s selection of songs for their set lists, once numbering 190 titles, has been slimmed down to about 60.

“During our heyday, we could do two long sets, and never repeat a song,” said Jackson. “But after a while, we couldn’t remember them all. There was a lot of detail there!”

The detail is still there. The band members do their best to make the songs sound like the original recordings.

“We would copy the musicians’ styles from those songs,” said Jackson. “We tried to detail them impeccably. But at one point we had a different keyboard player and he got us to loosen up a bit so we could kind of jam out just a little. So now we approach the songs somewhere between major detail and keeping it real rock ’n’ roll.

Asked if audiences members sometimes make requests, he said, “Oh, sure,”

Asked if the band has ever been stumped, he said, “Yeah. Just don’t call out ‘Free Bird’ or ‘Brand New Key’.”

The Band That Time Forgot plays at The Burren, 247 Elm St., Davis Square, Somerville on Oct. 13 at 7 p.m. Tickets: $19. Info: 617-776-6896, www.burren.com